Categories: uncategorized
Date: 26 August 2005 03:50:46
I love rain, I love looking at the moon. I love trees and clouds. I love the orthodox church service. I don't really feel anything while I'm there crossing myself and standing up and down. Except last week when there was no one standing in front of me and I kept glancing around to find everyone else sitting and me standing. Then I felt embarrassed. But each week I can't wait to get back there. I'm drawn back there. I have to go.
There's no personalities up the front at Orthodox church services, because the same thing is done, the same words said no matter who is leading. There's no liking one song and not the other, because the same words are chanted each week.
And the food afterwards is fantastic. I love home made baklava. The people are so genuinely friendly and have time to talk without rushing off to speak to anyone else. And each week I can't wait to get back there.
But it's a big ask for a good little protestant - (I told one guy I'd been to a Baptist church during the week - he asked me if that was a protestant church!) to suddenly venerate Mary every week, and accept that tradition is as important as the bible, and to read all these things about what happens when you die. Apparently, you can keep getting closer to God after you die, and still be in the midst of spiritual warfare. You still need prayer for yourself after you die.
The reason that all this is so important is that this is the church that the apostles themselves, the people who lived with Jesus, started. The churches I go to started in the 16th century. How come no one believed what I do for 16 whole centuries after Christ? It is a bit arrogant of myself to believe that I have all the answers, when the church for 16 centuries had different answers.